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Possessed of such powers, how does it happen that we do not
lay hold of them, but for the most part, let these high
activities go idle- some, even, of us never bringing them in any
degree to effect?
The answer is that all the Divine Beings are unceasingly about
their own act, the Intellectual-Principle and its Prior always
self-intent; and so, too, the soul maintains its unfailing
movement; for not all that passes in the soul is, by that fact,
perceptible; we know just as much as impinges upon the faculty of
sense. Any activity not transmitted to the sensitive faculty has
not traversed the entire soul: we remain unaware because the
human being includes sense-perception; man is not merely a part
[the higher part] of the soul but the total.
None the less every being of the order of soul is in continuous
activity as long as life holds, continuously executing to itself
its characteristic act: knowledge of the act depends upon
transmission and perception. If there is to be perception of what
is thus present, we must turn the perceptive faculty inward and
hold it to attention there. Hoping to hear a desired voice, we
let all others pass and are alert for the coming at last of that
most welcome of sounds: so here, we must let the hearings of
sense go by, save for sheer necessity, and keep the soul's
perception bright and quick to the sounds from above.
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